Monday, March 25, 2013

We Need Real Immigration Reform

The time has arrived for
President Obama and Congress to take immediate action on comprehensive, humane
immigration reform.

By immigration reform, I
am not talking about militarizing our borders, empowering employers to behave
as immigration enforcement officials and imposing fines and back taxes on
aspiring citizens. Instead, I am talking about allowing labor to cross our
borders as transnational capital does, preventing employers from exploiting
immigrant laborers and lowering application costs for future citizens.

Too often, when Democratic
and Republican leaders speak about comprehensive immigration reform, their
message mainly centers on enforcement-dominated policies. For instance, while
Obama spoke eloquently about immigrants in his second inaugural address, his
administration has deported more immigrants than that of his predecessor,
President Bush, during the same time period.

As the Obama
administration continues to separate hardworking immigrants from their families
and friends, I find it hard to believe the president when he says, "Our
journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving,
hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity."

I don't find the
deportation of more than 1.6 million undocumented immigrants during Obama's
first term in office as "welcoming."

Moreover, given that
Republican leaders remain hostile and pay only lip service to Latinos and
immigrants in this country, it's incumbent on Obama and Democratic leaders to
invest the necessary political capital for the benefit of the estimated 11
million undocumented immigrants in this country.

Instead of dehumanizing
and blaming recent immigrants for America's financial woes like the GOP, Obama
and Democratic leaders should demand that Latino immigrants be treated with
dignity, respect and tolerance.

More specifically,
Democratic leaders should educate and convince the public about the pivotal
role undocumented immigrants play in America's social and economic prosperity,
highlighting key characteristics like their willingness to sacrifice themselves
for their families, a strong work ethic and an entrepreneurial bent.

In developing a humane
immigration reform policy, both Democrats and Republicans should learn from
past immigrant policies with progressive elements. This includes the Immigration
and Nationality Act of 1965, where immigrants from Latin America, Asia and
Africa benefited from family reunification components of the law. This also
includes the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, where almost 3 million
immigrants qualified for amnesty. Republican leaders should learn from their
iconic figure, President Reagan, who signed this legislation into law.

Instead of doing what's
right in both moral and economic terms by proposing another amnesty plan, a
recent bipartisan group of senators, also known as the Senate "Gang of
Eight," introduced a regressive, comprehensive immigration reform
proposal. It includes a so-called pathway to citizenship for qualified
undocumented immigrants.

But it mainly focuses on
punitive measures, such as a “secured border” prerequisite before granting
citizenship, imposing fines and back taxes, deputizing employers to become more
effective immigration enforcement officials and creating an exploitable labor
pool of guest workers, like the Bracero Program of the mid-20th century - a
program that my father, Salomon Huerta Sr., participated in under inhumane
working conditions.

In short, there's only one
humane and simple plan for the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in
this country: amnesty.

Let's get over the
hostility to the term, and welcome the people who have been working in the
shadows.

[Álvaro Huerta, a UCLA visiting scholar at the
Chicano Studies Research Center, is the author of the forthcoming book, How the Other Half Gets Scapegoated:
Immigrants and the Working Poor in the U.S. (San Diego State University
Press). He wrote this essay for
Progressive Media Project, a source of liberal commentary on domestic and
international issues; it is affiliated with The
Progressive magazine.]